Glamour Isn't Very Nice
by Tinhen
Summary: [futureficimprovs 31-32] A rock star and an E! reporter and a Mercedes convertible on the side of a road in the Hills converse. And argue. And, they're both nuts. Coversational Ramble On (RoryDave) NO LIT, NO TRORY.


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Glamour Isn't Very Nice

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Title: Glamour Isn't Very Nice (1/2)

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Author: Tinuviel Henneth

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Disclaimer: They aren't mine, but I'm delusional. They're not yours, but you're delusional, too, if you think they're mine. And I still win because I'll have guests.

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Rating: eh, PG or maybe a little higher

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Improv **31**: lonely, shimmer, guide, cerulean, malaise

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Summary: A rock star and an E! reporter and a Mercedes convertible on the side of a road in the Hills discuss their present states. They realize they're not quite so alone as they'd probably like to think they are. Oh, yeah, and they're both nuts. Conversational Ramble On.

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Author's Note: It's ridiculous and my style was atrocious. It's dialogue-driven, not character- or description- and that's unlike me because I usually describe everything to death. But I think it's fun. The second half'll be fun, too.

Confident that she had another boring album release party under her belt, Rory Gilmore walked to her car. She wore an amazing knee-length sequined cerulean Versace and complimentary ocean blue Manolo Blahniks that were basically a sole, a stiletto heel, and two straps. And, thank God for California weather, she wasn't a bit cold without straps or a stole. She looked good on film, she looked good anytime, and now all she wanted was to find her keys in her matching clutch and go home to her big, lonely apartment and climb into her big, lonely bed. Then she heard the crunch of gravel behind her. "Leaving already?" a male voice asked. She turned and glanced up at her intruder through a swath of styled dark hair.

"You know how they are," she told him, gesturing vaguely up the hill at the house perched at the top. "I'm just a reporter and it's not fun after a while." She found her keys with a small squeal of triumph and held them up. They sparkled in the moonlight. "Well, I found my keys, so...uh, I'll be going."

He came towards her, and she glared at him. He had a beer bottle in one hand and the other in the pocket of his black pants. He didn't look right dressed down in dress up clothes. He was a jeans and tee shirts kind of boy and he just looked silly in big boy suits. "I was surprised to see you here," he said.

"Yeah, not nearly as surprised as I was to end up doing work like this, trust me." She smiled and slid into the driver's seat. She put the key into the ignition and as she was about to turn it and speed away from the house, he put his hand on the edge of the passenger side door. She stared straight ahead for a moment, cursing her decision to buy the convertible, and then she turned to look at him seriously. "Please unhand my car so I can go home." 

He shrugged. "I know you wanted to be important political coverage girl, but hell, nobody ever really gets to live the dream they had when they were little."

"Eventually I will," she snapped. "Please unhand my car."

"You host a show on E! right now. A hit show. Please, Rory, spare me the melodrama," he scoffed and took the last sip of his beer before chucking the bottle off into the bushes in front of the beautiful house.

"I don't care about it. Any of it." Her eyes flashed as she realized her brutal honesty and decided she had to retreat or all would be lost.

"Yeah? Me neither." He leaned forward, his forearms resting along the top of the door. "I really never expected to be here. I was some kid and I was in a band and suddenly, I'm the next biggest fucking thing since Paul McCartney. And, to tell you the truth, even though I fully know to never entrust anything to a reporter, I don't want it."

She rolled her eyes. "Yeah, I've never heard that before." She took a deep breath. "Why aren't you fulfilled?" she asked.

"I don't know," he said with another shrug. "It just doesn't matter, I guess. None of it does. Platinum records and big houses and Cristal and a shiny new Cadillac for every day of year if I'm so inclined, yeah those are nice perks. I'm not complaining."

"That's good to know," she snarked. "I bet it's so tough being a rock star." She'd heard the general megastar malaise too many times to count in the two years she'd been interviewing them. It had never managed to move her before. Maybe it was because she knew him as a teenager that he had an edge. She glanced up at the sky and was dismayed to see that the lights of LA obscured even the most tenacious stars. The purplish, dark grayness above her didn't bode well for an argument and she wasn't up to losing one.

"Hey, shut up," he said, but he was smiling and she knew it without having to look at him. "I worked hard to get here and now I'm realizing for myself what a thousand Behind the Musics preached. It isn't half as fun at the top as MTV makes it out to be. I'm unhappy and unfulfilled and I hate it."

"So go develop a coke problem and whine to a camera about it. You might just get the cover of People for your troubles," she said. "I want to go home now."

"And do what? Climb into a big, cold bed and go to sleep and dream about what you could have done in luscious anonymity? Don't deny that's not what you want. That's why I'm still here. To avoid that defeat." He stood up but kept his hands on her car. "It's not really worth it, you know?"

"Hey, maybe we're the same person split unevenly between two skins. That might atone for why we're both empty and why you can play the guitar and I can't." She raised her eyebrows sarcastically and sighed again. "Could you please just let go of my door? I really don't want to take those precious fingers of yours with me when I gun this engine and trust me, babe, I will if I have to."

He smiled at her. His eyes still crinkled the way they had when they were eighteen and she had to tell herself deep down that there wasn't anything between them because she had her boyfriend and he had his girlfriend and all they shared were not too dissimilar futures. He reached down and opened the door. Without a look at her face, he plopped down in her passenger seat and buckled himself in. "Well, for tonight, neither of us is going to be lonely, Ms. Gilmore." He punctuated his words by closing the door.

"I don't believe this. Get out of my car. No, seriously, get out of my car."

"No can do. This seat is far too comfortable." He stretched out and put his hands behind his head. "You wouldn't think a compact little thing like this could be so roomy and nice."

"I'll write a story that you and your drummer have something going on," she threatened.

"Wouldn't be the first time," he said, unconcerned.

"But your drummer is male this time!" she squeaked. "The public is still homophobic, even in this post-Will, post-Jack, post-Queer Eye for the Straight Guy world."

He raised an eyebrow at her and gave her the best smirk he could. "Rory, that is libel and you can't prove a letter of it. Anyway, why are you so desperate to get away from this place? You're a lecher now. You should thrive on all the stuff going on back in that house."

"You are seriously in danger of a severe head injury and I suggest you get out of my car now." She gave him a dangerous look and he had the supreme nerve to do no more than chuckle at her. "What?"

He turned his head to the side and gave her a calculating look. "I'm having fun. Are you having fun?"

"No, I'm not having fun. I'm annoyed and I want you to get out of my car before I get my cell phone out and call your manager or the police or the Times or something and have your ass dragged out of it."

"You're having fun and you won't admit it. That's cute."

"I am not cute, you...you...you...despicable rock star. Your kind is the worst, you know. Your whole lot. Smelly, somewhat unwashed--"

"I am not unwashed. I use Zest Sport and shower twice a day, I'll have you know, and I smell good. Sometimes, I've been known to actually shower three times a day."

"That's fabulous," she said in a very dry tone. She waved her hand dismissively. "However, you are a rock star. You belong to a group that is overall smelly and unwashed and misogynistic. You write whiny lyrics and build awesome guitar riffs and you expect women to swoon because we couldn't possibly comprehend the actual music, just that you're so hot and sweaty and.... You're important and you have money. My God! I better just shuck my panties off right now, huh?"

He laughed then trailed off as she sent him one of those volcano-freezing glares she was famous for. "I mean, um, only if you really want to." He gave her a weak smile. She sniffed and crossed her arms and faced forward. He couldn't tell if she was kidding or not, but felt obligated to backtrack and redeem himself anyway. "I've never actually had anyone throw their underwear at me." He paused and frowned. "Okay, so that's not true. A fat man threw his Budweiser boxers onstage during a show in Dallas. But that's Texas..."

"I'm making generalizations right now. Could you shut up for a minute, possibly?"

"Oh, go stereotype away, Missy. I won't speak again." He crossed his own arms over his chest and attempted to look very stern.

"Thank you," she said, a generous dollop of sarcasm in her tone. "Now, I was spewing about your type. The rock star set. See, I've interviewed dozens of you people and I've noticed that you're basically all the same. Now, don't get me wrong; some people are pretty real. Most aren't. I don't know if you are or not. I haven't decided yet."

"Are you real?" he countered, cocking his head to one side.

"What kind of a question is that?" she asked, bewildered.

"I hate this song," he muttered and settled back into his seat. 

She shot him a strange look and flicked the dial on the radio console. "I pay for my XM radio for a reason," she said and gestured to the breadth of stations it offered. "Since you're rather anti-AFI right now, how about I let you pick, eh? And before you ask, yes, this car is too small to store CDs in."

He pressed a chrome button and nodded. "Yeah, George Gianni' got one of these things. You know, bassist for Debilitate, dreads and husky eyes. I do believe you interviewed him at the Grammys last year. His is shimmering cadmium."

"I know who he is," she snapped. "I'm just wondering why you changed the subject."

"I mean as stimulating arguing is, I'm really far too inebriated to win a real argument."

She raised an eyebrow at him. "You had two beers and a Cosmo. That makes you a lightweight. No, a flyweight. Oh, that's rich. I could do better than that my freshman year of college, and I was an alcohol virgin then." She exhaled. "Mine's called titanium flash. Isn't Mercedes clever?"

"That the colors are actually in English, yes it is nice. It's hard to imagine what color rouge is if you haven't taken French."

"Mercedes is a German company, isn't it?" she asked, confused. "I mean, I know, bad owner not knowing for sure where her car was built, but I thought it was German." He shrugged. "And rouge is red."

"Yeah? I took Spanish. It has helped me so much in ordering Taco Bell in Cleveland at three o'clock in the morning and ordering McDonald's in Miami, but on the whole I don't really feel like I succeeded in learning anything useful." She smiled, but not necessarily comfortingly. "So, rojo is the way I'm doomed to follow," he concluded with dramatic flair.

"That's sad. I took French because it's the language of international politics and I wanted to do that. But hey, not everyone can be a serious broadcast journalist. Some of us have to be pretty and perky and personable. And, hey, look I made an alliteration."

"You should write George of the Jungle sequel scripts," he agreed, nodding gravely.

She snapped her head to the side and fixed him with a cool look. "That reminds me, why are you still in my car?"

"Why are you still doing what makes you unhappy?" he countered.

"Why are you still in my car? I asked you nicely to remove yourself from it and you refused. I told you rudely to get out and you still resisted. Do I really have to call up to the house to have a bouncer drag you out of that seat?" She crossed her arms over her chest and tapped her shoe against the brake pedal.

He shrugged. "I don't know why you're so uptight about my presence. Considering we come from the same microscopic town, I'd think that you would want to be as close to me as possible. You know, Yankee spirit and New England superior exclusivity."

"You know, there's probably a really chance you're delusional."

"Your insults are starting to really suck, too. Quality has gone downhill fast."

"Shut up," she said. "I'm tired. I want to get out of this stupid dress and take these stupid shoes off and I want to take a shower to wash off the grime of this stupid day and I want to climb into my own bed and sleep! Why are you so adamant about keeping me from my dream?"

He smiled, which was not what she wanted him to do. She smacked him on the arm. "Hey, don't attack me because you're tired!" he protested.

"I'm attacking you because you're still in my car and you won't leave me alone!" she snapped back, hitting him again.

"I'm going to bruise. I'll sue you," he said. "I'll sue E! and I'll sue your producers. I'll have your precious little job for that. You'll never interview another egotistic, shallow, occasionally talentless beautiful person ever again!"

She just snapped at those words. "You think I want this? I went to Yale! I went to Yale and now I write stories about who's screwing who in Hollywood. No. Scratch that. I don't even write the stories half the time. So, not only do I deliver asinine stories about who's screwing who in Hollywood, I deliver somebody else's asinine stories about who's screwing who in Hollywood. Do you think I care who's screwing who in Hollywood? I don't! I didn't care about Bennifer. I didn't even care about when Jen and Brad got married, and trust me, I'm the biggest Brad fan in Connecticut." She paused and frowned. "After Lorelai. And Lane. Nevermind. The point is I don't care." She crossed her arms over her chest, turned her head away from him and stuck her nose in the air.

He wasn't about to let her get the last word in. "You think I wanted to be a rock star? You think I wanted this life? I went to UCLA. I have a master's in Molecular Biology. I didn't want to play the guitar in a band. I wanted to work for the government. I wanted to clone humans and then have my...superiors deny it to the American public. I didn't want to have a Mercedes and models and a spirit guide and teenage girls screaming 'Marry me!' in those scary soprano voices of theirs. Contrary to popular belief, I didn't want that! I just wanted to be average and boring!"

She separated her arms and beat on the seat on either side of her thighs and turned to face him and shouted the only thing she could think of. "Get out of my car!" 

He turned to her and shouted back, "Fine!"

"Fine!" Both turned to face forward in unison, and it was like a really bad 1980's movie. Her mother would have been laughing her head off on the other side of the screen right about then.

A few moments passed, both breathing heavily. "You're not getting out of my car yet," she said in a soft voice. "Why is that?"

"One last thing," he requested. She turned her head and looked at him. He leaned in and grabbed the sides of her face and kissed her desperately and she kissed him back, even though she would later deny it. She threaded her arms around his neck and buried her fingers into his hair at the base of his neck, where is wanted to curl up naturally but wasn't allowed to. It had been pissing her off all evening anyway, looking all pathetic and tame and she had wanted to screw it up to its normal state since she spotted him at the door when he came in.

After a few minutes, she pulled back. "Oh."

"Oh," he agreed.

"This complicates things," she said.

"Indeed it does." He licked his lips and drummed out a lackluster beat on his lap with his palms. "So..."

"So."

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Written 14-18 October 2003

Tinuviel Henneth


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